(for Yilan)
here the sun stinks like stillbirth
& the sky is a stab wound, a gutspill
of light. the body’s largest
internal organ
is not the heart
but the stomach. my mother
learned this in two years
of famine. when the flood
ran past her door, she chose
to save the sack of rice
& not the girl clasping it
to float. she ate her own
tongue, chose swallowing
over speech. children in her village
were born with their mouths open
-firing. I load my throat
with gunpowder
& mother strikes me
like a match. while I sleep
she hot-glues
my knees together & tells me
every man is a bomb
the radius of your birth
country. silence is a mouth
firing holes into
my first language. on the shore
she gave birth, a Japanese soldier
stabled her with his horse. carved
teeth into dice. if they landed even
a woman was shot. odd
& rape instead. sometimes
death can wait for a man
to open his pants. sometimes
the soldier bangs her
like a door
& the body answering
from inside
her body is my body.
Contributor Notes
K-Ming Chang is a Kundiman fellow. Her poetry has been anthologized in Ink Knows No Borders, Best New Poets 2018, Bettering American Poetry Vol. 3, and the Pushcart Prize Anthology. She is a Lambda Literary Award finalist in Lesbian Poetry. She lives in New York.